Maybe it's time you stopped paying upwards of $100 for AAA games

Gaming is an expensive hobby, especially with most AAA games now costing upwards of $100 when you factor in the special, deluxe, and premium editions. And even when you simply want to pick up the base game, with no additional bonuses, you're still going to have to pay at least $70 for a current-gen AAA title.

However, despite AAA games now costing more than they ever have, most titles, especially on PC, are released in an incomplete and unpolished state. More often than not, players who pay extra to get early access or bonus perks as part of their pre-order incentive, end up having to play an unfinished and unpolished game.

The most recent example of this phenomenon is Suicide Squad Kill the Justice League, which, despite promising early access to players who purchased the $100 Deluxe Edition, did not make good on the promises. This got me thinking that it's probably time we stopped paying upwards of $100 for incomplete and rushed AAA games.

Note: This article is subjective and reflects the author's opinions.

While I mentioned Suicide Squad Kill the Justice League as the game that got me to finally pen down this article, I don't want to place all the blame on that game alone. I began seeing this trend of publishers releasing unfinished and broken AAA games while also charging more than the usual $60 admission fee back in 2020, with Assassin's Creed Valhalla.

As much as I now hate the sight of that game, I still look back at the time when I used to be hyped for every single new Assassin's Creed game. Assassin's Creed Valhalla was no exception to this. In fact, it probably was my most anticipated game of 2020 (after Cyberpunk 2077, obviously).

And to fuel my excitement, I ended up grabbing the Ultimate Edition of the game